Drifter
by li3atinali3
Summary: What was meant to be an easy journey to Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, turned into a nightmare of storms, deranged farmers and naked boys.
1. Dream

_I was running hard and fast, the sound of my footsteps seemed delayed to when my shoes slapped the ground, and the world seemed to pass by me at a snail's pace. But I ran on, only figuring out what I was trying to escape when I slammed right into it._

'_No!' I gasped. I was so sure I had outrun it this time. The shaded figure crouched down, and even though I knew exactly what it would do – crouch, lean back, arm back, arm forward, fist hard on my chest – I just couldn't stop myself from watching, hoping that this time would be different. _

_The pain reached right down into my being, forcing a sharp breathe out of my bruised lungs as I was pushed back into a brick wall behind me. _

Slowly, my heavy eyelids prized themselves apart readying themselves for the bright white ceiling I've looked at for the past sixteen – soon to be seventeen – years, but they needn't have bothered. Instead of looking up at the plastered roof, I was looking down at my messy bed.

Out of instinct, as one would in a situation as bizarre as this, I opened my mouth and screamed, trying unsuccessfully to unstick myself from the ceiling.

**x**

The dream I would never forget, and would constantly curse. It was the dream that led to this. It was the reason why I was now flying uncontrollably across oh, I wouldn't know, at least three different states, with only a small sparrow to keep me company.

What a drag.


	2. Evelyn and Vanessa I

**Evelyn and Vanessa  
I**

'Oh my gosh Evelyn! How'd you get up there? Get down!' Vanessa, Evelyn's twin sister, jumped out of her bed talking rapidly as she normally did when she was only starting to stress out.

'I can't!' Evelyn whimpered back. It felt as though she was thoroughly stuck to the ceiling by some weird reverse-gravity situation.

Vanessa paced around the room, her expression strained and her arms crossed, fingers clutching her elbows tightly. She stopped and looked up to her sister looking pained, which did nothing but increase Evelyn's anxiety – though she worried at almost anything, Vanessa would never look this stressed without proper reason.

'Okay, so, I've got this explanation alright… and I'm not too sure if you're going to like it. So just listen, yeah?' Vanessa sat on the bed beneath her sister.

'I'm not going anywhere,' Evelyn said, trying to shrug, which didn't work. Vanessa looked up at her in exasperation not appreciating the sarcasm.

'Since about grade two, I've been able to talk to birds,' she said, half to herself half to the wall on the opposite side of the room.

'Excuse me?' Evelyn practically shouted cringing at how loud that came out.

'Well, I haven't done it since then! Don't give me that look!' Vanessa glared at her through her fringe.

'I'm sorry, I fail to see what this has to do with me being you know, stuck on the damn ceiling,' Evelyn said smartly, growing more and more agitated.

'Shut up Evelyn and just listen! I'm thinking, well, maybe you've got these powers too and well – 'she stopped talking and looked towards their bedroom door, 'mum's coming.'

'Get me down!' Evelyn hissed, trying to push herself off using her fingers.

Vanessa raced around the room, pulling off the cords to various bathrobes and jackets and climbed up onto Evelyn's bed. She looked at Vanessa poignantly, questioning her actions as she tied each cord around her arms and legs. Vanessa jumped off her sister's bed and began to pull, lowering her back down to her bed. Once she had touched the mattress, she tied the cords to the slats below the bed and threw sheets over Evelyn's body as she clung desperately onto the sides. Vanessa leaped clumsily over the two meter gap between their beds and dived under her covers just as their mother walked into their room.

'Are you girls alright?' she whispered, standing at their doorway. Evelyn opened an eye slowly, thankful that Vanessa had pulled the sheets practically over her head, and watched as Vanessa convincingly sat up in her bed as if she was just being woken up.

'Yeah, why?' she yawned.

'I just thought I heard someone shouting,' their mother replied.

'Maybe it was next door?' Vanessa suggested, getting back into bed, cocooning herself under her sheets and ignored their mum until she walked out of the room, telling them that we should start getting ready for school.

Vanessa slowly and quietly got out of her bed and walked over to her sister who laid there looking extremely agitated and nervous.

'Do you think that if I untied you, you'd go floating off to the ceiling again?' Vanessa asked, assessing the strained knots under the bed.

'I think I'm getting rope burn,' Evelyn groaned – the material tied around her wrists and ankles were holding her down, but her body kept trying to force itself up.

'Hang on,' Vanessa rushed over to her desk and pulled a large backpack on the chair.

'This will probably kill your back, but it'll keep you down on Earth…' Vanessa dumped a whole lot of heavy looking text books belonging to both her and her sister, and dragged it over to Evelyn's bed.

'At least, I hope it will,' she mumbled as she untied Evelyn from the bed.

'I'm sorry, was that a flicker of doubt? Because I really don't need that right now…' Evelyn began to rise upwards as her hands became free.

'Here! Hold onto the bag!' Vanessa pushed it up on the bed with a grunt and held the straps up to Evelyn, who threaded them over her shoulders.

'Okay, I'm untying your legs now,' said Vanessa as she crouched down and reached under the bed.

Evelyn could feel her body wanting to soar up, but couldn't against the heaviness of the bag on her back. With some effort, she managed to force her legs down until she was sitting over the side of her bed.

'Too bad you don't have weights for my shoes,' Evelyn grinned trying to stand up.

'Just make sure you keep it on all day, even when you're sitting down,' Vanessa helped her sister up, whose knees almost buckled under the weight on her back.

'I'll just have to ditch gym then,' Evelyn sighed. She really enjoyed that particular class.

'Don't go to the kitchen unless you have to, alright? Mum will ask questions about the bag, and I don't even want to imagine what dad's gonna say,' Vanessa skirted out of their bedroom as their mother shouted down the hall for them to hurry up.

'That's alright, I wasn't hungry anyway!' Evelyn grunted as her sister left.

* * *

**AN:** I'm going to mention this once. Chapters will be divided up differently this time and they will be short. That's just how I'm doing things with this story!


	3. Gabriel I

**Gabriel  
I**

I'm getting old. Or perhaps I'm too old. My limbs are slow are tired, my joints ache, I can barely see through my partially clouded eyes and my food needs to be softened and warmed before I can go anywhere near it. Maybe it's time for me to go. Surely they won't mind, I mean, they can always get another one of me. Heck, I can always come back to them. They were really very caring. Not once was I kicked or smacked. And I was so well behaved, they didn't think it was necessary for the surgery. Though, that wasn't an act. I definitely am not interested in well, ugh. Practically bestiality. No thanks, not for me.

I'll have to speak to the older ones, but I think they've started to catch on.

**AN:** Reviews would be an amazing encouraging force to compel me to continue this story... **seriously**.


	4. Evelyn and Vanessa II

**Evelyn and Vanessa**

**II**

'You don't even want to know how difficult it was to get dressed,' Evelyn glared as her sister walked back into their room, running her hands through her light red hair, cut into a cute pixie-style.

'Why didn't you just wear a skirt or a dress or something?' Vanessa asked, picking up her own – significantly lighter – backpack.

'Because, oh I don't know, maybe those sorts of outfits aren't so great for a girl who keeps floating off the ground?' Evelyn replied, glaring at her twin. 'Mum hates your hair, by the way,' she added, watching her sister style it with some gel, 'I'm surprised she hasn't guess, about you know… considering how much time you spend with Mallory,' Evelyn grinned. 'And that new look certainly doesn't help.' Vanessa stopped and turned to her sister, trying to glare but looking rather anxious.

'But she still doesn't know? They both don't… right?'

'Who knows? Maybe I'll feel compelled to tell them. Or maybe I have…' Evelyn fiddled with a strap on her bag.

Vanessa threw her deodorant at her laughing sister, narrowly missing her head. 'You're just saying that because I forgot to bring you breakfast!'

Evelyn shrugged and pushed herself off her bed using every ounce of strength in her body to remain upright. She walked out of the room and down the hall towards the front door where their mother was waiting for them, holding her keys and tapping her foot impatiently.

'Evelyn, I spoke to your school specifically so that you didn't have to carry that many books around, you know how your bones are!' she fussed trying to pry the bag off her daughter.

'It's only for a few days! They've just piled a lot of homework on us!' Vanessa pushed them outside the house, closing the door behind them.

'Then why does your bag look a lot lighter than your sister's, Vanessa?' their mother paused as she unlocked the car.

'She left them at Mallory's,' Evelyn smiled at her sister as they got into the car, receiving a hard punch on her arm as the car reversed out of their driveway.

'See you tonight girls!' their mum waved goodbye after they stumbled out of the car – though it was more like after having Vanessa pull Evelyn out. They stood at the gate and sighed.

'Can you hear them talking now?' Evelyn asked, looking up at the trees with birds sitting in them.

'Yep,' Vanessa replied, looking at them too.

'How did you control it?'

'I didn't; I always listened. When we turned seven, I realised it wasn't normal so I stopped listening. It came back this morning,' she replied, looking annoyed.

'Put us together, and we're a human-bird,' Evelyn tried to joke, but it was hard to laugh when her back was screaming with agony.

'Gosh Evelyn, you're so lame,' someone slapped her on the back of her head, 'you talk about the weirdest things sometimes.'

'Hey Mallory,' said Vanessa, her face lighting up as a short, dark-skinned girl joined their conversation.

'Why did you get rid of the blue?' Evelyn asked, pointing to Mallory's jet-black hair.

'My mum threatened to kick me out of the house when I got home,' she sighed, 'but that's alright… I left some in underneath.' Mallory flipped her head over so they could both see the midnight-blue streaks.

'My mum can be the biggest spaz sometimes,' she shrugged, eyeing Evelyn's bag.

'Yeah, she's had lots of homework…which is why she's going to the library,' Vanessa pushed Evelyn through the school and towards a medium sized demountable. Evelyn rolled her eyes and staggered to the small building, trying her best to keep her balance.

x

'Daniels! Take off that bag, get into your sports gear and get going!' Evelyn's gym teacher yelled from across the auditorium. They were meant to be outside playing football, but the slightly muddy conditions had almost every female student recoiling in horror, much to the amusement of all the boys. Instead, they were inside where a number of mini games of basketball, jump-rope, dodge ball and a strange combination of golf and hockey had erupted all over the place.

Evelyn had managed to make an excuse in all her classes all week for having to carry her bag around all day, and found ways to remain seated without much trouble. Still, she pretended she hadn't heard her teacher, and returned to completing her French homework.

'Daniels, this is the third time this week that you've skipped gym. If you don't get out there, I'm going to have to give you detention,' he stepped through the raging crowds and stood over her.

'I don't feel well…' Evelyn muttered, keeping her voice down.

'Let me guess, it's the remnants of that bout of food poisoning you had on Tuesday? Or the cramps on Monday?'

Evelyn must have spent a little too long thinking of a reply, because the next thing she knew their teacher had blown his whistle and everyone stopped to face him.

'We're going outside,' he announced, waving his hands to the looks of disgust thrown in his direction. Evelyn repacked her bag and slung the straps over her shoulders, but before she could stand up, her teacher stood in her way.

'You can leave your bag here.'

Evelyn watched as he walked out of the hall, hauling a massive bag of assorted balls behind him.

'I could just not go…' she thought out loud, wondering if it was worth the detention. She was just about to sit down, when she glanced over to a small group of students that had finished collecting their own sports equipment and were moving out. Josh was there. Evelyn giggled a little as he looked over. Not wanting to look silly, Evelyn swallowed hard and pushed her backpack off her shoulders, clutching the bleachers she was sitting on.

'This isn't so bad,' she murmured, not feeling as if she was going to float away. She slowly stood up and walked over to the doors leading to the small grassy lot, holding to anything bolted to the ground – just in case, cursing herself for not making the effort to befriend anyone in this particular class, her friends being in all her other classes but this.

She knew she would have to let go of the door handle eventually and move into the open area, but she couldn't prize her fingers from the bar.

'Oh no,' she moaned watching a student jog over. 'Anyone but him!'

'Hey Evelyn, Coach told me to get you,' Josh said, looking at her strangely. Or, that's what she assumed he had said – she was too preoccupied imagining him running over to her in slow motion, arms reaching out to her, his wavy, long blonde hair flowing in the breeze, sun beaming down…

'Um?' he stood awkwardly, looking back to his friends playing football longingly.

'Sorry,' she said – possibly in her head, or out loud, she really couldn't tell.

'Are you alright?' he asked, noticing that she hadn't moved, and that she was clutching onto the door handle rather tightly.

Evelyn was straining her arm to hold herself down on the ground. Thankfully Josh hadn't noticed that her feet were hovering an inch above the ground.

'I'm fine,' she giggled slightly, instinctively raising her hand to her mouth in embarrassment.

'Whoa!' Josh exclaimed stepping back in shock. Unfortunately, Evelyn had raised her right hand – the one holding onto the door, and was slowly rising in the air.

'Uh,' Evelyn looked around wildly, trying to find something to blame this on – a sudden gust of wind? A broken helium canister? Anything!

Josh didn't say anything as he backed away slowly, mouth and eyes opened in shock watching as she rose higher, bumping her head on the door frame.

'Wait! Um… could you help!' she called out before he could get any further. Josh looked conflicted, but ran back. 'What do you want me to do?' he asked, his voice rising.

'Could you uh, bring my bag over?' she cringed as he ran over to the bleaches, and dragged her heavy backpack on the ground. He pulled her down by her leg and she was able to grab hold of the bag and slip the straps over her shoulders. Josh blinked, shook his head and ran to his friends without looking back.

Evelyn stood up, feeling rather disillusioned at her prince charming, steadied herself and ran out of the gym, only intending on stopping once she got home.

* * *

**AN:** Thanks for the reviews - they're keeping this going! Keep it up! :D


	5. Gabriel II

**Gabriel  
II**

I had to leave. I started to change right in front of them. _We don't have scars like that_ one of the older ones said to me, accusing me. I had forgotten about that scar. It's the first thing that appears, and it's what ultimately confirms all their suspicions. Damn my father and his blind rage. Damn my mother who drank herself stupid. Damn my brother and my sister for ignoring me when I knew they had the same problem. They didn't know it, but it was going to happen soon enough. I could sense it.

She held me down whilst he came at me with the broken bottle. My brother laughed from the stair rails, my sister watching with mad tears rolling down her face. I didn't fight back because she was my mother and it wasn't until then that I had seen that side to her. I don't remember what they were saying; I was changing in her arms, in his face. But he had enough time and enough sense in him to mark me before I could get away.

I wonder if they ever got the blood stain out of their plush white carpet.

My sister had come looking for me when she realised she was turning blue. I think she knew that I would always hang around. She knew she was talking to her brother when she confessed how scared she was. How she needed help. How she could only hide for so long. But I was spiteful and I ignored her.

This was two lifetimes ago.

Who knows what came of those wretched people.

* * *

**AN:** Sorry this took so long, I've been super busy.  
RIP Meli, you were the best cat ever!


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